Peek A Boo

Sawyer at his Aunt and Uncle's over the holidays.

Busted

Today started out rough. Traffic was backed up on the highway so I got off and took surface streets in an attempt to get to the office by 8:30. I had made Rice Krispy treats for an office bake sale and they were supposed to be in the 4th floor conference room by that time. Supporting our Troops became a little more expensive this morning as my haste on the surface streets resulted in a citation from the Farmington Hills Police Department. Arriving even later and bummed about the extra $150 or more that this will cost me I was happy to find this Dilbert taped to my monitor:



While no one likes being compared to PHB (Pointy Haired Boss), I have a bit of a reputation for doing exactly what he did. I work on the server team at my company so my peers have elevated privileges and we should all be in the habit of locking our workstations when we leave them unattended. The penalty for failure is usually an instant message to a peer from the unsecured pc. The standard message is, "I like nekid Star Wars". It is a real conversation starter.

Although I would prefer the cash, it is nice to be noticed (and loved/loathed) enough by my team mates to have them cut out a comic that made them think of me and take the time to tape it to my (always secured) workstation. Idiot invading my perimeter be damned!

(about the ticket - the officer said he was doing me a favor by reducing my 49 in a 35 to "impeding traffic" as that carries no points. There is no fine listed on the ticket so a quick google revealed that is a relatively common thing that is good for the no points.. but carries a $20 greater fine than the real ticket. I am not sure what the points would cost, but I suppose that is a favor by the officer. I have not had a speeding ticket since I was long distance dating my future wife. Traveling between Washington, D.C. and Akron, OH resulted in two performance awards on the PA turnpike in one year. That was in 1998/1999 so I guess they have been expunged. Farmington Hill's finest said that I had no previous tickets.)

12-1 in the regular season of the office fantasy football league means nothing when you lose in the first round of the play offs. DOH. The only saving grace this weekend was the stressful victory of the Steelers over the Cowboys. I am not sure I could have taken both losses... and truthfully, if I had to chose one or the other.... I would take the Steelers victory all day. Next week is the big matchup against Baltimore. While not a must win, it is certainly a should and better win. I have a double or nothing dinner riding on it with my parents and bragging rights when I take the family home to Baltimore for Christmas. Go Steelers!

ZOMGWTFBBQ!!1!!

A work buddy e-mailed me about the Steelers taking it easy on LT.. he needed the points. I sent this reply and then went to look up how close I was on the penalty difference and thought that there was something wrong with the NFL site... they still had the score as 11-10.

My e-mail:

I don't normally bitch about the officiating.. but come on!! It was like the refs had money on San Diego or something. Sooooo many no calls on SD for holding (don't think there was one all game but I saw a ton) and calling every infraction on the Steelers. The Steelers committed 12 more penalties than the Chargers? Or did the Chargers get called 12 less? Hmmmm.

At least my boys got it done this week.... I would be fuming if they had not.

They let him have a TD...what more do you want? 100 yards? Heh, not this year.

J

-----Original Message-----
From: XXXXXX
Sent: Sunday, November 16, 2008 6:39 PM
To: XXXXXX
Subject: Pitt

Tell pitt to ease up on ladanian....I neeed the fantasy points.......

It turns out I was incorrect about the penalties, SD was charged with 2 to Pittsburgh's 13 and I am absolutely floored about the final. I watched the game and I thought it ended 17-10. www.espn.com and www.nfl.com both have the final as 11-10. What gives? The spread was 4.5 and it seemed like the officials did everything they could to keep it in that... including taking a couple of TDs off the board. I can give them the Willie Parker TD called back for holding.. but the Polamalu one at the end of the game is pretty much ridiculous. The Steelers got the win, but it was still very frustrating to watch James Harrison get held on most plays, blatantly facemasked, and have it not called once while every infraction of the Black and Gold is flagged.

Whatever officials. I am die hard Steelers and think Football is the king of pro sports but the league is really dissapointing me this year. I think some of the responsibility lies with the commish, bitch-ass Goodell. I miss Tagliabue. I do not agree with the league "cracking" down on the hits. All of these fines that are issued after the game for plays that were legal and (correctly) not called during the game. For feck's sake, its football. Not flag football, tackle football. We all understand the business side of the game, i.e. it is bad for the business when you lose a Tom Brady for the season (but feck him and all the Pats fans too), but that is a risk that is assumed when the players suit up.

I am running out of steam and have no real intention other than venting. Summation? This season has been the most memorable in my lifetime of being a fan for bad officiating, bad leadership of the league, and frustration as a fan. Goodell and the officials GFY.

Dammit

Poker Time has been filled in with WoW lately. I don't have a character high enough to do any of the new content in the Lich King release but I still get to experience the delays to logging in. Worst of both worlds :-)

Life has been nuts since this July and I have taken a hiatus from poker to a more +EV game (although it guarantees me to lose $14 each month). It is nice to have a rough week and then smash through stuff with my work friends on Tuesday nights. While the peaks are not as high... it lacks the troughs of poker. I am getting enough of the negative variance in real life right now.

On the odd trivia/bright side, I am now renting a townhouse that is sandwiched between two Detroit Lions players. The QB, Orlovsky, and the long snapper.... and I no longer have the care and maintenance of the grounds and driveway of our dream home. Silver linings and all that.

Happy Halloween!

Sawyer's First Halloween:

We went to pick out a pumpkin on the 30th

And he was a skunk!

Migrations

Tonight we started our first pilot group of roughly 50 users that are transitioning from IBM's Domino Lotus Notes to Microsoft's Exchange for e-mail and calendaring.  It is going well but running into the expected snags here and there.  If I can figure out this last one the evening may end earlier than I expected.  That would be good because we will all be back here tomorrow morning to finish up.

Sad to see Iggy out as I enjoyed watching his status via Tao of Poker updates.  Well played Iggy and Pauly.

If I can get a dependable internet connection at home this weekend I expect to get some time in on the virtual felt.  Wish me luck.

Internet Tilt

Do you think Comcast would reimburse my $11.50 they cost my by inexplicably dropping my entire neighborhood's internet (or at least the two neighbors with unsecured wireless) in the middle of my HU match?

It was extra cool of them to allow me to connect back for a split second to see that my 2k to less than 1k lead had been whittled away to about 1200 chips for me and then drop me again after the glimpse.

A big FU to Comcast and all it's comcastic shittiness. Man that is frustrating....

Always Amusing

Sometimes the chat is a good jopke

Overheard after spinedo1 hit a gutshot to cripple mikedill:

mikedill: i know you dont win at sngs

spinedo1: cuz i'm sure you play perfct every time

mikedill: when sitting next to you it could look that way

mikedill: an infant could look like a pro



mikedill
Games Played: 2,922
Avg Profit: $3
Avg Stake: $27
ROI: 10%
Total Profit: $7,396

spinedo1
Games Played: 269
Avg Profit: -$1
Avg Stake: $4
ROI: -20%
Total Profit: -$190

New Experiences

At the risk of getting into Absinthetics' niche, who had a great post about childproofing your home the other day, I wanted to share my experience with traveling with a 4 month old. On the subject of Absinthetics it seems that I have been following in his footsteps with his child raising experiences. Pretty soon Sawyer will be mobile and I will be going through the same home safety exercise. It is pretty cool to read the experiences of a much better writer that is walking down the path a few steps ahead of me.

I have come to the realization that the amount of kit a person requires to travel is inversely proportional to their size. 10 days in Florida and all my big ass requires is one suitcase. 10 days in Florida for the baby requires a slightly smaller suitcase and a pack-n-play and a stroller and a car seat and a diaper bag and formula and his play mat and all other kinds of crap. All of this must be checked (to the tune of an extra $25 for the 5th piece of checked luggage for the pack-n-play) or processed by TSA. I have to admit, I was nervous about the airport security and the baby. I have flown before and witnessed parents struggle with all the gear and misbehaving kids at the security scan. They try to jam strollers that will not fit and load the entire scanning conveyor belt with kid accouterments. All this while dealing with crying or wild kids that will not listen. Throw in a liberal amount of lightweight hi speed business travelers queued behind this circus and you can see why I would not be able to relax until we were settled in at our gate.

All in all, it went much better than I expected. The stroller did not fit, and even though it was obvious to me, the TSA dude still made me try to shove it in the scanner. The biggest issue at the airport was declaring the baby formula (more than 3 oz of liquid) since it was recommended that we have the baby eating during take off and landing to help ease the pressure in his ears. The biggest hassle was lugging all of our crap. SteelerSteph had a diaper bag and pushed the stroller while I tackled the task of moving 4 suitcases and the pack-n-play. It did not work out too well as I had to piggyback the suitcases (2 and 2, the bigger ones hauling the smaller ones) and balance the pack and play on top of one pair. That sucked until the van picked us up in the parking lot and then sucked again in the airport. Freed of the checked baggage we headed to security to get scanned. That went much better than I expected but was still tough and I was glad to be through. An hour and 15 minutes to kill before the flight and Sawyer managed to have one diaper change and a big spit up on SteelerSteph. Her left shoulder smelled like sour milk baby puke so I tried to stay on her right side. :-) She takes it like a champ, I guess the pure unadulterated love helps balance out the highs and lows.

We had a layover in Orlando and arrived at Ft. Meyers at about 10:45 last night and as I am typing this I already have played in a few SNGs, drank 4 beers and enjoyed the baby inexplicably sleeping in until 12:30 this morning after getting up at 5 AM for a feeding. Vacation is good and I have a nice week ahead of me. My sister in law is getting married this weekend so we are in Sanibel Island, FL until next Friday. http://www.lesleyandchip.com/ has our itinerary. Welcome BBQ tomorrow, golf and rehearsal dinner on Saturday and Wedding on Sunday. I have a lot of drinking and eating ahead of me... so as much as I would have to liked to attend the Weekend at Mookies 2, having a buzz before 12:30 on a Thursday really softens the blow.

Time to go put in some QT with the wife and sit on the beach with her some (while drinking some more beers) and think about how lucky I am. Holla if ya hear me.

Happy Hour Doooooosh

For DNasty13: Got it all in on the flop.

Told ya I would take care of that aggro monkey! :)

Fun playing with you.

The Goat Speaks for Me

http://jgoat.blogspot.com/2008/04/viva-la-bbt3.html

Julius Goat fast became one of the reads I look forward to most when I fire up Bloglines. I have him categorized in the LOST section, but it is very hard to pigeonhole a talking goat so that was more a selection of convenience. If you are not up on his Table Profiles and Stupid System you owe it to yourself to browse his archives.

The Goat's latest post struck a chord. I think he nailed it on the head. I am happy to play the blogger tournaments now and then and appreciate all the people who play, set up the games, and do the really special stuff like BBT3. It is kind of weird how catty and dramatic a lot of the poker blogosphere has become lately. The name calling and other bashing is nothing new, nor is the calling out and comment wars.... but the amount of people that have allowed themselves to get caught up in the pseudo-drama seems new to me. If nothing else, it makes the morning read slightly more interesting... but overall seems pretty silly.

On a poker note, I played the first blogger event in awhile with the Mookie this week and managed a 3rd place finish for my efforts. Overall I was happy with my performance. I played very tight:

and I had two notable suckouts. One kicked off my final table run, the other ended it. I was ITM and I misread BuddyDank's hand when he limped with Kings in the highjack. I raised 3x from the BB and BD called. The flop came 8 high with one over to my pocket sixes and two diamonds. BD bet out the size of the pot and I put him on a flush draw. I jammed and he had me covered and called. I nailed the 6 on the river to cripple him and had a couple chip lead over PureProphet. It was a tough beat and BuddyDank took it well.

The last suckout occurred at my elimination. Memphis00 had been running very well and single handedly took out most of the final table. He was playing his big stack well and getting the cards he needed. He made a standard steal raise from the button and I went all in over top with my pocket 8s. He called with 35d. The flop seemed harmless enough with only one diamond. When the 4c hit on the turn I knew I was in trouble. The Ace on the river sealed my fate and I was out. I snapped a screenshot and watched the end as it only took a few more minutes for Memphis00 to make a flush on the river to eliminate Astin. I was happy with my performance and think that I could have given Memphis00 or Astin a run for 1st if those 8's stand up.

I wish Memphis00 all the luck in the TOC and might try the Mookie again next week. It was as fun as I remembered it... and maybe a little less chatty than I recall. Perhaps my expectations were too high from reading all the complaining or I never sat at the worst poker player's table. Either way, the chat seemed pretty tame and it was a lot of fun.

Confidence Booster

Technically I am in greater need of an immune system booster but the win I booked this morning helped me feel better. I took off the second day of work this week due to the gunk that has taken up residence in my head and sinuses. I feel that I am starting to turn the corner today and will likely be back at the salt mines tomorrow. I am looking forward to getting back to the office because there is so much to do there.

The baby was fed, dry, and getting sleepy and SteelerSteph was headed to a doctor's appointment. My mom was on standby in case Sawyer got fussy. What to do? How about a 90 seat $3+.30 KO sitngo? Sounds like a good fit. I want to try my hand at some larger field low buy-in games but I rarely have the time to devote in case I go deep. I watch DNasty13 splash around in these things and they look like fun. I think the KO format is a bit of a hedge since you have a chance to get some or all of your buyin back even if you don't make the money. The flip side is that it decreases the final table payouts but that usually is not a problem for me.

Here were my stats for the whole game:

I played pretty tight through the whole tourney and really caught some cards at the end. Early on I doubled up with trip sevens and was never below average again. Down to the final two tables I was steadily in the top 3 and played my big stack pretty well. I would pick my spots and attack the middle and bigger stacks and leave the shorties alone unless I had great cards. On the final table bubble, during hand for hand, I really made some aggressive moves and was able to get some separation as I padded my stack. The final table bubble soon broke and 9 spots paid. One player had T260 and it was pretty sure they were going to pop the money bubble.

Money bubble popped and I set about to play smart poker. I managed 2 big resteals and kept myself in the top 2 chip spots without really risking much of my stack. Overall, the tourney played pretty fast and I was able to pick my spots. Suddenly (or at least it seemed that way) we were down to three with two of us almost even in chips and third place well behind. I had restolen once from williteverend and watched him play relatively loose but decent poker and he was getting out of line now. I knew it would only be a matter of time and I would get his chips. I did and had almost a 5 to 1 chip lead over the "happy to be in second place money because of the real donkey that busted out when he did not need to" guy that was left. I doubled him up once to 68k but made sure I kept the pressure on and soon had him back below 30k to my 240k. I felt a bit like cat playing with a mouse and ultimately got him all in with his K6 against my K10. My hand held up and I was pumped. Not a bad way to dip your toes back in the FT waters.

I collected several KOs along the way (probably 8 total) and had a blast. It is easy when you get good cards and your heavy favorite hands stand up. I think the best manipulation play of the day was when I got 99 to get it all in against my AQh on an all heart K high flop. I used the clock, the min-re-raise and all of my best online acting skills. It feels good when all the chips are in and the opponent is drawing dead on the turn.

Blah

I hate being sick and not feeling 100%. I doubt that anyone likes it, but I really can't stand it. Luckily, I am pretty healthy and don't come down with gunk often but something is working the immune system right now. I felt a tickle and cough in the throat last night and today I am oscillating between being uncomfortably hot and uncomfortably cold. Did I mention the lightheadedness and watery eyes? Boo being sick. I am trying to stay away from SteelerSteph and the baby. I can't imagine what it would be like if she was out of commission. I guess you can't breastfeed when you are sick so that would really suck for Sawyer. If one of us has to be funkified, I suppose I am the best candidate right now.

I took a 2 hour nap and then some Advil Cold and Sinus washed down with a dose of Emergen-C and I am feeling better... but I can feel the presence of the funk on the peripherals of my head. Will have to see how it goes. I should be more pumped because I finally loaded some money on Full Tilt today. The juice was about 11% by the time I purchased a $100 Visa pre-paid (5.95) and then it was not accepted on BoDog or PokerStars. Poop. Tired of railing, I bit the bullet and created an ePassport account. $5 more for their piece of the pie and I had $90 on Full Tilt. It would have been $95, but the "verification" process had a pending charge of $1.69 and I was not sure what was being charged by who so I only loaded $95. I will have to figure out what to do with $5 on a prepaid Visa... save it for the next one? :-) Not if I practice proper BR management.

Wish me luck heading off this gunk and perhaps I will be making a cameo at one of the blog-aments in the near future. See you there.

Despite my distaste for all the major candidates

I did vote today and I would strongly encourage my fellow blog readers to vote too.

You can do it over the internet anytime you want. Proposition 3.17

Prop 3.17 is important enough for me to blog about my support, and I know that the blogfather will be voting if he has not already.

Irish Americans, and those of us that wish we were Irish on that one day of the year so we could sing along with those awesome sounding drinking songs, have a duty to vote yes for Prop 3.17.

Amen.

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What's New Pussycat?

Zebus (the Cat), originally uploaded by STeelerJosh.

Feeling the urge to get a post up but nothing exciting happening on the poker front (as in no poker at all recently) so a general update will fit the bill.

Sawyer is being Sawyer and we are adjusting pretty well to his routines. SteelerSteph is headed back to work next week so that is a hurdle on the horizon that needs to be cleared, but I think we will be able to take it in stride. My mother is coming up from Baltimore this weekend to stay with us and provide excellent grandmotherly day care for the next 5 weeks. That will really help the transition back to work but will also provide some challenges of its own as we all absorb the adjustment to our lives. It has been a long time since I "lived" with mother. I can only hope that she pays my house the same respect I paid hers and does not keep a messy room, have friends over when I am not home and water down my liquor. Oops. Paybacks are a bitch I suppose.

Generally, life has been pretty general lately. Most of the poker and motorcycle riding has been accomplished vicariously through all the other great blogs out there (congrats to: GCox on all your recent success, Jordan on your Bloggerment win, Hoy on your 50/50, Chad on your FTOPS 9 performance... I watched you play for awhile but bailed at 12:30 when there were 140 some left, Surflexus on all those Mookie final tables and wins and everyone else that seems to be enjoying success lately). Everything else is baby and work centric with patches of sleep grabbed when possible.

Sawyer is getting more interactive and enjoyable everyday. This is good because I really look forward to coming home from the increasingly stessful work days. The project I am managing has had some technical issues that really pushed me to the limits the past 2 weeks. I have it all sorted out now but I am pretty disappointed in Microsoft documentation. Coming from the IBM/Domino world it has not been an impressive transition in using the MS documentation for Office Communication Server 2007. The project is still on track to be delivered on time (and over budget) but it should not be this hard. I had lunch with the CIO today and alluded to some of the challenges but assured him we were still on track. That is true, and will remain true, as long as I can get this Public Internet Connectivity provisioning process on track with Microsoft. That is a seemingly simple administrative process where we register our new Instant Messaging (ghirly chat for all you ghey bloggers) servers registered and authenticated with the major IM providers: Yahoo, AOL, and MSN. I built the servers, tested the crap out of them, and federated with some other companies so I know my stuff is tight.... but I can't seem to get an traction on getting the request to turn it on with these providers up the chain and in the right places at Microsoft. Who knew that would be so hard? It is frustrating because you expect the hard parts in getting everything built and configured properly not in getting a form completed and an authentication (federation) process started. Booo administrata.

If you are a real sicko and are curious what OCS 2007 is, check out this link explaining one of the servers (an EDGE server) that has been kicking my nerd skills up and down the block the past two weeks. Happy to say that I finally got it all in line, but I was plagued with certificate and connectivity issues along the way.
Edge Server Topology

Best of luck to all you poker bloggers who are still playing poker. I will have to explore some options to get some of the bankroll back online so I can donk it off when I get .... make some time to get back up on Full Tilt. Until then, the proud papa in me wants to leave you with this:

Reason to play online poker #7: When I get pocket Aces on the button with 2 raises in front of me, I make that same face.

Big Poppa

I have discovered that all the advice and maxims about parenthood that people offered to us about becoming parents does not become real until the baby does. Cards with the sentiment, "get some sleep now dad, ha ha" were plentiful but simply could not prepare me for the harsh reality of "parenting" a newborn. I use the term parenting liberally because at this stage it is probably more appropriately "care taking".

"Sleep when he sleeps" - Sage advice, yes. Damn near impossible to accomplish. If the infant eats an average of every 2-2.5 hours that is a good amount of sleep between, right? Umm yeah, not so much. Through reading of parenting and baby books (such as "Babywise") you will learn that nursing infants should eat for a good 15 to 20 minutes per breast. Do the math - 2 x 20 minutes = 40 minutes. That math works using the assumption that 20 minutes of feeding will take 20 minutes. Ooops. Often it takes 30 minutes per side to get a good 15-20 minutes of feeding. The first two weeks it was my job to annoy Sawyer while he was eating so he would stay awake and actually eat. This was accomplished by rubbing his head, tickling his feet, changing his diaper, etc. So back to the math. 40 mins feeding = 1 hr. 2-2.5 hours - 1 hr = 1-1.5 hours. Not quite. After he finishes eating he is awake for a bit. The natural inclination is to put him back in his bassinet once he is back asleep.... and then lay there listening to him to make sure he is really asleep.... and not, for some irrational fear, suffocating on his blanket. That requires getting out of bed and making a visual check. Bottom line the equation works out like this:

60 minute feeding + 5 minute awake period + 5 minute diaper/outfit change +10 minute falling back asleep allowance = 80 mins

120 - 80 or 150 - 80= 40 to 70 minutes of sleep between feedings. Don't even get me started on the times he wakes up 20 minutes after falling asleep because he has gas.

All that arithmetic was to highlight one concept that is still boggling my mind - How is SteelerSteph still functional?!?! She has not had more than 2 hours of uninterrupted sleep in almost 3 weeks but is still being a great new mother. She is not complaining (much) and has embraced the job of caring and loving little Sawyer like she was born to do it.

__________________________________________________________________

I am back at work this week and it has been a mixed bag. I am more tired than I have ever been at work but I am still getting it done. We are in the midst of many high impact technology projects right now and it is pretty exciting to go to work each day knowing the impact my work is having. As a firm, we are transitioning from multiple IBM Domino (Lotus Notes) centric systems to the equivalent Microsoft solutions. For example, I am leading a project that is deploying Office Communicaton Server 2007 to replace our current Instant Message software called Sametime. It is going pretty well although slightly behind (I can pinpoint that to my two weeks away from work with the baby) and slightly over budget. This is not as much of a concern as it normally would be since we have instituted a "first to the trough" policy. I purchased an entire IBM Blade chassis, a $15k of switching hardware, and $13k of Virtualization software that I will only be using a portion of, but since I was the first to this point it is charged to my OCS budget. Planning, testing, and then deploying and troubleshooting the new software has been a welcome challenge. After I get my OCS servers ship shape I will be jumping feet first into a Lotus Notes to Microsoft Exchange 2007 SP1 migration. That will be a much more complex project. All of this new technology will be deployed firmwide this June. Right now it looks like it will consist of Vista on the desktop, Outlook/Exchange for Mail, OCS 2007 for Instant Messaging, Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server (MOSS) for collaboration, and a new Identity Management Software solution from Novell to manage all these accounts. Shaping up to be very fun (hectic, busy, crazy) spring and summer at work.

___________________________________________________________________

Poker and a new baby turned out to not mix very well. I managed to deplete my $50 seeded bankroll on Full Tilt. Playing $5 and $10 SNGs with a bankroll under $100 is not advised, especially at odd hours when you are trying to comfort a fussy baby and cannot sleep. I do not have Poker Tracker installed on the new computer so I don't have much to review but I am confident it was a mixture of some bad luck, poor play, and pushing the limits to chase losses. Not sure how many diapers $50 would have purchased but it lasted at least 5 months at the low levels of Full Tilt tables and gave me some satisfaction and ultimately some frustration. Casual poker player? No doubt. It is tempting to re-load somehow so I can play in some blogger-ments but I feel like dead money in most of those due to the caliber of players.... but it is still fun and worth the price of admission.

Finally, I understand now the severe decrease in posting frequency (after becoming a dad) by one of my favorite reads, Absinthe. Wishing him luck in his live games this week.

Happy Dad

Happy Dad, originally uploaded by STeelerJosh.

Sawyer Charles came early this morning. He clocked in at 6 lbs 9 oz and was 19.5 inches long. Mom and baby are doing great. He came a little earlier than expected but was still considered full term at 37 weeks. I am still trying to absorb it all and spend a good bit of my time staring at him. Kinda hard to explain, but the dads out there probably know where I am coming from.

SteelerSteph blames the Steelers-Jags game for his early arrival. That and maybe the gameday chili we had. Regardless, we are pumped that he is here and healthy! Happy Birthday Sawyer.

Boooo

In addition to high blood pressure, gripes about the annual horrible post season officiating, and frustration in some of the Steeler play calling.... I am left feeling unfulfilled. I don't think they had the personnel or the play calling to go all the way again but I do think that they should have won the game tonight and I really would have liked to see them give the Pats a run.

On the piss poor officiating of the playoffs - why does it seem so horrible every year? In both games I watched today there were blatant no calls, unexplicable overturned calls, and phantom penalty calls. I don't know why the NFL does not keep regular season crews together for the playoffs.

Enough steam blown off I suppose, time to dwell on my dissapointment until the next season..... oh wait, perhaps only as long as it takes for the next generation Steeler fan to arrive in the SteelerJosh household! SteelerSteph is ready to pop and I am amazed that this game tonight did not send her into labor. Yeah, I suppose that will put it in perspective and quickly bury this loss in the archives of my brain.

Looking forward to reading what MeanGene has to say about the game.